Cell immobilisation by electrostatic droplet generation

Abstract

This paper reviews the feasibility of electrostatic droplet generation for the production of uniform hydrogel microbeads and applications of this technique for cell immobilization. This is a novel extrusion technique that uses electrostatic forces to disrupt a liquid surface at the capillary/needle tip and form a charged stream of small droplets. Experimental parameters which are critical for production of polymer microbeads (in the range of 0.1 to 1 mm in diameter), as well as mechanisms of alginate droplet formation are presented here. It was shown that microbead size was a function of applied potential, polymer surface tension, needle size and electrode geometry. In addition, this technique was applied for immobilization of several cell types (yeast, mammalian and plant cells). There was no detectable loss in viability of these cell cultures after exposure to high electrostatic potentials. Cultivation studies of cells immobilized by electrostatic droplet generation showed good maintenance of cell viability and activity, indicating broad potential of this technique for the immobilization of a variety of cell types for applications in different fields of biotechnology, pharamceuticals and medicine.